Pre-Tour and London, England

Two to three weeks before leaving on the trip you receive your tour documents in a nice carrying wallet. If you are coming from the US the contents will be roughly the following: Contiki calling card with 5 minutes free (online rechargeable), Travel Insurance plan information (if purchased), numbers for all major airlines, a copy of your itinerary, a Contiki luggage tag, a one way ticket on the London Underground (if you are coming from Gatwick or Heathrow, when you book make sure to confirm you can get this), a Contiki Europe travelers guide, excursion vouchers (if you did the referral program), and travel documents which include your ticket to ride, hotel bookings before and after, sleeping bag voucher (if from US or Canada), and insurance policy.

Also before you leave it is best to call your credit card companies and let them know you are traveling and to include dates / countries so they can note your account. If they do not know you are going to be abroad they will think someone has stolen your account and put it on hold until you call and sort it out. Not a fun thing to do. I only took my credit cards and ATM cards (make sure it has a 4 number PIN) and removed money out when I got there. Travelers cheques are not worth the hassle as most places do not accept them and you get charged insane fees for using them. ATM cards are the normal ATM rate plus up to 3%. There are a few cards in each country that are lower and you have to check around for the best one. My capital one credit card has a zero percent conversion fee which I used for a lot of large purchases which helped out a lot.

After some of these pre-tour things are taken care of you are ready to go and the adventure begins..

May 5th, 2008 Flew on United from Dayton, Ohio to London, England (layover in Chicago).

May 6th, 2008 Landed in London at 8am and the adventure begins

I arrived in London and had to immediately head to customs. Surprisingly the line for customs for GB citizens was longer than visitors, and I was through within 15 minutes without hassle at all. Then it was time to collect my bags and head to the Royal National to dump them before heading out for the day.

The London Underground is the best mode of transport to get around, and if you are there for multiple days, purchasing a pass is the easiest solution. It took about 5 minutes to figure out how the tube works and then easy navigation for the 3 days I was in London. The tube drops you off 1 block from the Royal National and is only about a 5 minute walk to drop the bags off in their check room which has an attendant at all time plus they ticket your bags for extra precaution. Then it was on to the city!

First I had to pick up my London Pass which let me get into pretty much all London sights without wait. I ended up walking down thinking it was very close, and got lost for about an hour trying to find the place. I would not recommend wandering the streets of London when the tube is available, unless of course you want to get lost. Once I found the London Pass office it was off to Westminster Abbey!

I had wanted to see Westminster Abbey the most out of any place in London, so obviously I'd hit it first. Admission is 10 Pounds and worth it for such a wonderful building. The cloister gardens are open two days of the week and are free with admission and worth walking through if you are on a nice day, even if they are rather small. After spending about an hour in the abbey I bought a few gifts from their gift shop including a shot glass (2.5 pounds) and a magnet (2 pounds). After that it was a short tube ride over to St Pauls Cathedral. Highly Recommended.

St Pauls Cathedral is one of the 4 largest domed churches in the world (or so I was told) and is insanely massive. Entry to this was included on the London pass and I went in and wanderd around for a bit plus climbed 400+ stairs to the top of the dome for wonderful views of London. After taking in the sites it was time for a ham sandwich lunch with a sprite for 5.40 pounds and a quick break. Recommended.

Being on vacation it was time to go again, and I crossed the river in a short walk to the Globe Theater, also included on the pass. I did not know what to expect and was almost hesitant about going. The first part of the attraction is a museum you can wander around at free pace, with included memorabilia from original sets. The second part is a guided tour around the globe theater itself. We were lucky in that a few days later a new play, A Midsummer Nights Dream, was starting. It was at this time that when we toured the theater the actors were rehearsing long segments of the play. We sat there for 30 minutes watching different scenes and were told they dont normally do such long scenes in a single rehersal, it is normally one scene over and over again. Very cool. Highly Recommended. If you see a show, however, purchase a seat and not standing room only, it would get very tiresome standing for hours on end.

After the Globe Theater I wandered over to the Tower of London and Tower Bridge. The Beefeater guards stop giving tours at 3:30, and I arrived around 4:30 so I decided to wait the next day. Instead I went up Tower Bridge for some views of the city. Having been up St Pauls Cathedral, Tower Bridge wasn't anything special. It was included in the pass so I figured I'd do it, but if I had to pay I'd much rather have gone to the Cathedral. Afterwards I grabbed fish and chips near the Tower of London for 5 pounds and headed back to the hotel for a long sleep to recover from being awake for over 35 hours.

The Royal National accomodations were not that bad. I booked extra nights through contiki for $55/night in a triple share room. My two roommates were on other contiki tours, one leaving and one just returning. It was comforting to be with people on contiki and not random strangers. The only complaints I have about the Royal National is that they have no air conditioning and the windows barely open. With 3 guys in the room it got very hot very quick and was slightly uncomfortable. However I later found that lack of air conditioning is a common feature in most hotels in Europe. The other issue was that the keys would deactivate really quickly in rooms of three, and I went through about 5 cards in a 3 day period. I figured it out to be that if one person uses the key, the door deactivates the cards for the other two, quite frustrating. For the price and central location its hard to beat though, and being so tired I didn't care.

May 7th, 2008

The following morning I woke up at 8am, after sleeping for 12 hours and wandered down to the Wellington Arch, also included on the pass. This monument is massive, much like the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. The pass lets you go up to the top for a pretty lackluster view, and should be skipped. Afterwards I went to the Hard Rock Cafe to buy my dad a London Pin for his collection (6.5 pounds) and walked to Buckingham Palace to find out that the changing of the guard was cancelled for the day, oh well.

After that setback I decided to wander over to one of the worlds most famous department stores, Harrods to walk around for an hour. Harrods is insanely expensive and insanely cool. Some stores include the traditional grocery store, jewelry store, toy store, pet store (coming soon), fossil store, mountain bike store, piano store, egypt store, etc. After being tempted on a 2000 pound mammoth tusk I decided to buy a 8.95 shot glass set instead being more in my budget.

I then went back to the Tower of London and followed all the local business people to a small deli restaurant for a spiced italian sausage sandwich and water for 4.50 pounds and went to the Tower of London with a Beefeater tour. The tour lasted about 45 minutes and is entirely scripted (they tell the same jokes). In either case they gave a lot of useful information and hillarious jokes. Once the tour is over you get a chance to wander the grounds on your own to see the Crown Jewels and the Armory. This was my second favorite place in central London next to Globe Theater, so its highly recommended. I bought a 12.50 pound Knight coaster set to sit out and went back to the hotel to drop off stuff I bought and clean up for my ride on the London Eye.

I took the tube back down to the Parliament and the London Eye and ate at a food chain called Wagamama, which specializes in Asian cuisine. I got a tasty seafood ramen for 9 pounds + tip and headed down to my 8:15 appointment on the London Eye for great views of the city. At first I thought the London Eye was a rip off for 20 minutes, but after riding on it it was definitely worth it as you could see Westminster Abbey, Parliament Building, St Pauls, and even Buckingham Palace off in the distance. Very cool. Great way to end Central London. That night my roommates and I met other contiki people (who I later ran into in Rome) at the pub at the Royal National and hung out for a few hours with drinks (a pint of Guiness was 2.90 pounds plus tip).

May 8th, 2008

The final day I was in London I purchased a day tour with Evan Evans tour company to go to Windsor Castle, Salisbury Cathedral, and Stonehenge.

The tour picked me up at the Royal National at 8am and the first stop was Windsor Castle to see the Queens Doll House, the State House, and St Georges Cathedral. Ironically we were there to catch the changing of the guard (the Malasian Guards were on duty in London) and I determined it to be pretty lackluster and not upset I missed the one at Buckingham Palace, which is almost the same thing. Windsor Castle and city was cool to wander around and I grabbed lunch at a small deli, a thai chicken baguette, lemon water, and chips for 5.69 pounds.

After Windsor we headed to Salisbury Cathedral, a 750 year old church that holds one of the 4 remaining copies of the Magna Carta. This church was awesome and in the middle of a huge restoration project. It was really neat to see the different sides of the building before and after restoration to see how good of job they really do. I had no interest in Salisbury but after leaving really enjoyed it and the tiny city that surrouned it.

Finally we went to the place that made me take a day tour in the first place, Stonehenge. It is weird to think that stonehenge is over an hour outside of London in the middle of nowhere, and that what is sticking out of the ground is only a third of the entire stone. In either case, the weather was perfect for us to walk around and take pictures from behind the little tiny ropes (which are only a foot off the ground). Even though it is in the middle of nowhere and an hour away, if you get a chance, definitely take a tour out to Stonehenge, its very cool.

I was dropped off near Wellington Arch and took the tube back to the hotel to make it back for the pre-tour meeting just in time. The pre-tour meeting at 7pm just consisted of the tour managers saying hello and telling you what time to meet in the morning, plus giving the general rules again of baggage weight and what you can and cannot bring. It wasn't anything special, and you can miss it if you have to, you just need to check in with the tour manager in the morning with your documents and passport (they did this at the pre-tour meeting). It lasted about 20 minutes and you were on your own, and I just picked up a hot dog from a street vendor for 2.50 pounds to finish off the night since I had to wake up at 5am the next day.

Some interesting things about London that I noticed. The city is clean. Too clean. Almost immaculate, and there are almost no trash cans to be found sitting out. On the down side, the air is very poor however you dont really notice it until you leave the city. Coming from a smaller city in the US, I also noticed that people drive like crazy and I would never, ever want to drive in that city.

For those going on contiki tours it is mentioned at the pre-tour meeting that the ferry over to Calais, France does do currency conversion but rips you off, and its easier to do it in the city (the Royal National has one). The ferry accepts Euro and Pounds but gives change in Euro. Its recommended to switch over there as on the Whirl the first rest stop does not have an ATM and only accepts Euro (although I later saw the bathroom DID accept pounds).

And the Contiki dream began the next morning when we departed at 6am to the white cliffs of dover (2 hour drive) and crossed over into France on the ferry (1 1/2 hours) and purchased the largest breakfast ever (7 items) for 12 euro. We drove through horrible traffic in Belgium and arrived at a service stop in the Netherlands (3 hour drive, 45 minute break) where I purchased a cake snack with fruit topping for 2.30 Euro. A short drive later we finally arrived at our hotel in Amsterdam for the first stop of the tour.

On the drive to the Netherlands we had a bit of 'group sex' where the middle chairs of the coach rotated around so that you got to talk to half the people on the tour group for a few minutes each. A good way to do it such that no one got put on the spot on the microphone saying 'hi my name is.. i am from.. i like...' After getting to meet everyone I found out that out of 51 people there were only 4 americans (one being me), a few Kiwis, one girl from South Korea, and the rest were split between Australians and Canadians (half of which were from Toronto area).

Pictures Attached: I uploaded a few pictures of scenery and accommodations in London. In future posts I will also upload pictures of the day sheet and any included/optional excursions and meals. To find the rest of my pictures from London, go to the following albums:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2086492&l=29588&id=21902759

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2089621&l=fd905&id=21902759

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2089622&l=248ff&id=21902759

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2089623&l=1365c&id=21902759

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2089624&l=bcb1e&id=21902759

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2089625&l=8ea21&id=21902759

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2089627&l=58057&id=21902759

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2089629&l=1df0c&id=21902759

Jun 2, 2008

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